Final Report of the International Commission on the - Minority Rights ...

declaring in <strong>the</strong> parliamentary session <strong>of</strong> June 19, 1866, “…we have stated that <strong>the</strong> Government does not
intend to hand <strong>the</strong> country over to <strong>the</strong> Jews, nor to grant <strong>the</strong>m rights that affect or damage in <strong>the</strong> slightest
way <strong>the</strong> interests <strong>of</strong> Romania.” The following day he labeled <strong>the</strong> Jews a “social plague” (plagă socială)
for Romania, that
…pure and simply because <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>ir large number threaten, as everyone acknowledges, our
nationality....Only [strong] administrative measures can save us from this calamity and prevent this
foreign underclass from invading our country .
Two days later, a revised text that specifically excluded Jews from acquiring Romanian citizenship
was introduced as Article 7 <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> new constitution:
The status <strong>of</strong> Romanian citizen is acquired, maintained and forfeited in accordance with rules
established through civil legislation. Only foreign individuals who are <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Christaian rite may acquire
Romanian citizenship.
By <strong>the</strong> end <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> year <strong>the</strong> harsh restrictions <strong>of</strong> Article 94 <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Organic Regulations (Regulamente
Organice), imposed on <strong>the</strong> principalities by Russian occupiers in <strong>the</strong> 1830s, were reinstated.
Brătianu’s antisemitic language sharpened from that point on, as his influence in succeeding
governments grew. As Minister <strong>of</strong> Interior in 1867, Bratianu issued a series <strong>of</strong> Circulars to prefects across
<strong>the</strong> country ordering <strong>the</strong>m to enforce harsh exclusionary measures against <strong>the</strong> Jews, restricting <strong>the</strong>ir right
to live in rural areas, expelling <strong>the</strong>m from certain livelihoods, and exposing <strong>the</strong>m to physical expulsion
from Romania. Protests from abroad, from foreign governments that were seeking to guide Romania
toward independence as well as from Jewish organizations, fur<strong>the</strong>r intensified Bratianu’s antisemitic
rhetoric . Setting <strong>the</strong> tone for many <strong>of</strong> his countrymen who looked to him for national leadership,
Bratianu responded to a parliamentary question from P.P. Carp about <strong>the</strong>se policies by laying blame on
Romanians who hired Jews for creating a situation in which “<strong>the</strong>y have latched on to our land so tightly
that we will never be able to get rid <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>m,” and laying blame on <strong>the</strong> Jews for bringing down <strong>the</strong> wrath
<strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> great powers <strong>of</strong> Europe on Romania and serving as tools in <strong>the</strong> hands <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> nation’s enemies:
...Jews, even when <strong>the</strong>y commit crimes, are better treated than o<strong>the</strong>rs....Not because Jews have greater
morality than Christians, at least when it comes to fraud, but because whenever you lay a hand on a Jew,
all Israelites, not only in Romania but abroad as well, come screaming....[I]f you lay a hand on a Jew,
even one caught in a crime, a Consul comes to you and says, “This is my subject.” Whe<strong>the</strong>r he is or is not
a foreign subject, a Consul always appears to say he is....This is what <strong>the</strong> enemies <strong>of</strong> our nation are doing
today; <strong>the</strong>y are taking <strong>the</strong> Jews and using <strong>the</strong>m to attack us .
Two years later he summarized his view in a single sentence:
The goal <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Jews is nothing less than to put an end to our national existence .
Bratianu was not <strong>the</strong> only 1848 revolutionary to adopt such extreme views as Romania moved toward
independence. Thus we find Cezar Bolliac labeling <strong>the</strong> Jews “a real parasite” (un adevărat parazit) and
complaining that while Jews are <strong>the</strong> same everywhere, nowhere is <strong>the</strong> Jewish problem more severe than
in Romania: